tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52001492600110254252024-03-20T11:26:34.784+11:00Tech ChompWhen tech bites are not enoughAlan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.comBlogger55125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-6424874308953481442020-02-11T21:12:00.000+11:002020-02-11T21:12:42.093+11:00Friendly advice for young engineers<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br /><br />Recently I’ve been reflecting more than usual on career choices, and I would like to think I’ve accumulated some wisdom over the years. It has been over 38 years since I entered the workforce as a graduate electrical and electronics engineer. I’m still practicing, although as a software engineer. Over the years I’ve been promoted many times at many companies, large and small. I’ve been in roles from engineer to VP of engineering, and even CEO. Even with all of my different official roles, I have always self-identified simply as an "engineer" and I think all engineers should. Doing so reinforces two things. First, we are all in the business of engineering, regardless of where we sit in the org chart. Second, it helps to take ego out of the equation.<br /><br />As evidence of what I view an engineer's role, I love this quote by physicist Freeman Dyson:<br /><br /><i>“A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering."</i><br /><br />The primary advantage of age (yikes, I’m almost 59) is simply that one has had more time to accumulate knowledge and experience and to reflect. Quick learners can and do accelerate the accumulation of knowledge, but experience is a different matter. It is hard to compress decades of experience into mere years, assuming you would want to even attempt it. It reminds me of the movie “Click” in which the protagonist, played by Adam Sandler, has a magical remote control that lets him fast forward through his life to skip the ”boring” parts. The movie didn’t exactly win any Oscars, but it makes a good point. Life’s magic sometimes happens in the boring parts.<br /><br />Losing your ego will help you become a good engineer, but I also have some other practical advice for young engineers. We’ll start with more philosophical advice and end with more practical suggestions. You shouldn’t fast forward to the practical parts though, else you’ll miss some good stuff.<br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Be a good person</h3>
Don’t just be a good engineer (technically sharp, get things done, blah, blah, etc.), but strive to be a good person. Don’t be the engineer that is always defensive, always quibbling, always negative. Be positive, be supportive, give credit, be respectful, be inclusive, be nice. Losing the ego will go a long way in this regard. You’ll be a better team player and less defensive if you do. SVP of Google, Urs Hölzle, put it well when he wrote a memo to Google employees entitled “I don’t want to work with jerks”. <br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Follow your heart</h3>
Following your heart means giving yourself the opportunity to follow your own curiosity, and seeing where that takes you. This may well mean ignoring the advice of people around you, who don’t get it. Take heart from the fact that many of the world’s greatest inventions came from people shunned by others. Following your heart is the best strategy, not just for a rewarding career, but for a rewarding life. <br /><br />By way of example, when I graduated from university there was only one thing I wanted to do, which was to live in Japan. My father told me "You're wasting your engineering degree!" I followed my heart anyway and everything flowed from there, and I mean EVERYTHING. Becoming interested in automatic (machine) translation, going to Stanford University to study AI, meeting my wife, working for a Fortune 50 company, doing Silicon Valley startups, etc. All because I wanted to live in Japan!<br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Think about impact</h3>
By impact, I mean the impact you’re having on the world. During your career you’ll be confronted with myriad choices. Those choices will be easier for you to make if you frame those choices in terms of their impact, and, importantly, what that impact means to you. Others might advise you to pursue the financial opportunity (generally speaking, horrible advice) or to pursue the growth opportunity (good advice, if it involves personal growth). I’m advising you to pursue the impact opportunity though. Personal growth will at any rate follow if you’re making a difference.<br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Understand the big picture</h3>
The best engineers are the ones that think big, where here I’m talking about the technical big picture. Relate how what you’re working on, regardless of how small a component it may be, fits into the overall system. Doing so will help inform you and, in particular, help you to navigate design decisions. Being curious about the big picture will also make your job a whole lot more interesting. <br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Care about cost and timeliness</h3>
My corollary to the Freeman Dyson quote:<br /><br /><i>For technology to be useful, it has to be affordable and timely.</i><div>
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Typically the newer and more radical the technology, the more expensive it is. Avoid it! Good engineers are always on the hunt for ways to remove cost and get things done more quickly. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Caring about cost also means thinking about manufacturing early on in the engineering process, not as an afterthought.<br />Follow the data<br /><br />Get the relevant data, run the numbers and let the data decide. Data is apolitical. It beats opinion.<br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Master the written word</h3>
Whether it’s just an idea or a detailed design, write it down and get good at it. The process of writing forces a clarity that thoughts or conversations alone can never capture. It also facilitates sharing and openness, and rightfully or wrongfully, it also imparts an aura of credibility. Of course, keep in mind that writing something down does not make it correct! <br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">
Be open</h3>
Bill Joy, the co-founder of Sun, famously said:<br /><br /><i>"There are always more smart people outside your company than within it".</i><div>
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The best ideas can't possibly come from within the 4 walls of any one company. Be open and learn from outsiders. Conversely, wherever possible, be open to others. Sharing is a 2-way street.<br /><br />I’ll end it there. You may not agree with everything I’ve written. There is such a thing as “survivor bias” after all. I’m nevertheless hoping that my openness at least resonates with you at some level.<br /><br />All the best in your engineering career!</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-80819606148995298812017-09-21T10:18:00.000+10:002017-09-21T21:44:03.494+10:00Fun with video in Go<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I have a personal programming project which involves streaming video from IP cameras to the cloud. My fallback language for quick projects is generally Python but I've been meaning to use Go more seriously and this seemed like a good application.<br />
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Go is a young programming language. It was created in 2007 by Robert Griesemer, Ken Thompson and Rob Pike, colleagues of mine at Google. Unlike Python, Go is a compiled, statically typed language, but it comes with conveniences such as garbage collection and some memory safety features, plus support for concurrent programming. The authors' motivation was to make it much easier to work on large programs (the norm at Google) through these and other features such as fast dependency analysis. My program is anything but large (barely 500 lines), however it does perform a lot of buffer manipulation and bit fiddling, IMO, much better suited to Go than Python.</div>
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I named my program '<i>revid</i>' since it is a testbed for re-muxing and re-directing video streams as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG_transport_stream" target="_blank">MPEG transport stream</a> (MPEG-TS) over various protocols. I chose MPEG-TS because the packets are fixed in length, making them easier to manipulate and stream.</div>
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The cheapish webcams I'm using only stream over <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Time_Streaming_Protocol" target="_blank">RTSP</a>, therefore the first order of the day was to convert that to MPEG-TS. I use the wonderful open-source program <i><a href="https://ffmpeg.org/" target="_blank">ffmpeg</a> </i>to remux RTSP to MPEG-TS (without altering the video codec, which is my case is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC" target="_blank">H.264</a>). Go makes it easy to pipe another program's output with the os/exec package.</div>
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Revid then slices and dices the MPEG-TS packets in different ways. For example, to send as RTP (r mode) to <PORT> on the current host, passing the video and audio as is:</div>
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<span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;">revid -i <RTSP_URL> -m r -o rtp://0.0.0.0:<PORT></span><br />
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BTW, did you know you can stream RTP to a player, such as <a href="https://www.videolan.org/index.html">VLC</a>, without the need for RTP Control Protocol (RTCP) or Session Description Protocol (SDP). Well you can!<br />
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I also learned (the hard way) about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presentation_timestamp" target="_blank">presentation timestamps</a> (PTS) which ffmpeg and video players require to play MPEG-TS, but which are not present in RTSP (at least not my camera). I added a flag (-f option) to fix that and enable other features, such as removing the audio.<br />
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For example, to post as HTTP (h mode) to <HTTP_URL>, while fixing PTS and dropping the audio:<br />
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<span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;">revid -i <RTSP_URL> -m h -f 3 -o <HTTP_URL></span><br />
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I thoroughly enjoyed my first little programming project in Go and see myself using the language a lot more in future. I've created an 'av' (audio/video) repository on BitBucket as this is just the first of several projects to come. You can see the source code and Readme in the revid directory <a href="https://bitbucket.org/scruzin/av/src" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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Thanks to my colleagues who reviewed an earlier version of <i>revid</i>. I am entirely to blame for any residual ugliness, although please keep in mind this is not intended to be production code :-) See <a href="https://golang.org/" target="_blank">golang.org</a> to learn more about Go.</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-92041812923666217222016-10-14T09:54:00.000+11:002016-10-14T09:55:29.295+11:00Trekking the Kangaroo Island Wilderness Trail<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzHidz-om4ZsPJ8WqXYAUek1lnjOhaxoWPEkrfkGPpCcnbJFfZjLbAJ_yBHZUi-6JAwb6cJc9uQToDfVgfF-S3b6sGJDGWuWl0r5wT2FlFnia-jDaIZnA8XYbFAAzHi72OVefI0S7plwww/s1600/IMG_20161014_083754.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzHidz-om4ZsPJ8WqXYAUek1lnjOhaxoWPEkrfkGPpCcnbJFfZjLbAJ_yBHZUi-6JAwb6cJc9uQToDfVgfF-S3b6sGJDGWuWl0r5wT2FlFnia-jDaIZnA8XYbFAAzHi72OVefI0S7plwww/s400/IMG_20161014_083754.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
Yesterday I had the privilege of attending the official opening of the <a href="https://www.environment.sa.gov.au/parks/Visiting/Bushwalking/ki-wilderness-trail" target="_blank">Kangaroo Island Wilderness Trail</a>, a new 66 km trail that traverses some of the most remote and spectacular coastlines in Australia. Back in May I was lucky enough to walk the trail before it was open. Unlike many of the thousands of people who will hopefully walk it every year, I wasn’t carrying a regular backpack on my back. I was carrying a Streetview Trekker (shown at right). These high-tech devices, which weigh 18 kg, have an array of cameras that take photographs at 2-second intervals. The images are then stitched together to make beautiful 360-degree panoramas. Sometimes they’re mounted on top of a vehicle, or on a big tricycle (wheeled through a museum), and sometimes we carry them on our backs. You’ve probably seen Streetview images on Google Maps.<br />
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I believe it was a world first for Google to walk a trail that not only wasn’t yet open, it wasn’t yet complete! There were no trail markers at the time and we actually lost our way a couple of times.<br />
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You may well ask, why would we walk a remote trail on Kangaroo Island? The answer lies in Google's mission: to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. Bringing the world’s amazing places to the web is part of that mission. As a South Australian who loves nature, I want to share our great pristine wildernesses with the world. I want as many people as possible to come and visit SA in person and see our amazing sights with their own eyes. But for some that’s just not possible; so now they can visit virtually through Google Maps and Street View. If you go onto Google Maps and look close enough you’ll be able to see the amazing flora and fauna along the walk, including many curious wallabies.<br />
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Bringing different places and cultures to the wider world is just one of the ways that we at Google like to use technology to assist people.<br />
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Here are <a href="https://goo.gl/photos/s2r5Xege85M2T62J9" target="_blank">photo highlights</a> from the section of the trail that I hiked (the first 26 km).</div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-68532726845881980722016-08-07T19:03:00.001+10:002016-08-09T09:25:25.945+10:00Adapt to survive, and aim for moonshots<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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In the corporate world there are few more irresistible — and dangerous — forces than inertia. On the road to success lie the carcasses of countless companies whose dying words were: <i>“But that’s how we’ve always done it ...”</i> Once a business has evolved from being an idea in the mind of an entrepreneur, to a startup, and eventually a mature business with comfortable cashflow, it seems illogical to consider changing anything.<br />
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Inertia is the tendency of things to keep going at a constant velocity. But economies and industries don’t behave that way — they speed up and slow down, expand and contract, frequently change directions, and are propelled by constant technological advancement.<br />
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Harvard professor Clayton Christensen first used the phrase <i>"<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovator%27s_Dilemma" target="_blank">the innovator’s dilemma</a>" </i>when describing the challenge that faces companies when new technology arrives that threatens their core business. Do they focus on their current customer base or adapt to meet future opportunities?<br />
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In Australia we face it at a national level as the riches from the mining boom dwindle and we redefine our future based on the knowledge economy. Europe, the US, Japan and China are all starting to make long-term bets based on the inevitability that their economies will shift as a result of disruptive changes such as the sharing economy, and innovative technologies like artificial intelligence.<br />
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That transition requires investment, but in a world of finite resources how do we allocate them to adequately service the existing sources of income while simultaneously investing in future revenue streams? This conundrum can be paralyzing. But, difficult as it may be, we must not turn our back on innovation.<br />
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At Google, we recognize the need to constantly invest in the future, and at the heart of that investment is research and development. In our core search business alone, for example, we run thousands of experiments each year — of which maybe 1 per cent might be adopted. It’s why Google invests so much in diversity, too, because as much as it is simply right to ensure we embrace people regardless of their race, gender, religion and ethnicity, it makes great business sense: a diverse workforce is more likely to contribute a diversity of ideas.<br />
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We also know that it’s just as hard for a big company to successfully innovate as a small one. Success is equally as elusive, good and genuinely novel ideas are just as hard to come by, competition from inside and out is brutal, and while a large company may have the advantage of a bigger marketing machine to put behind its idea, unlike a smaller company, it also suffers from organizational antibodies that attempt to kill anything new.<br />
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But, just as a small startup that is not innovative will struggle to survive in the long run, so will a large company. It is a cliche, perhaps, but truer than ever that big companies must be the masters of their own disruption. And they must fight against the inertia — the impulse to protect their core products and services at all costs, at the expense of innovation.<br />
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Once they have the intent to innovate, the next challenge companies face is how to do it. One way of approaching it is to take aim at a big problem, something so large it almost seems preposterous to take it on. As Einstein once said: <i>“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.”</i><br />
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At Google we call these problems moonshots. Although it sounds counterintuitive, making something 10 times better may be easier than making it 10 per cent better. If you’re just aiming for 10 per cent better, you invariably end up using existing tools and assumptions and have to make progress through sheer incremental effort. But if you shoot for 10 times better, it forces you to start over, question all your existing assumptions, change everything.<br />
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As a bonus, the bigger you go, the more inspired you’ll be and the easier it will be to attract other people to join your cause.<br />
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The ultimate judge of entrepreneurial success is the quality of execution. Companies that embrace innovation must be data-driven, readily admit when things aren’t working, and willing to adapt.<br />
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Data and innovation go hand in hand. At Google we believe that it’s critical to experiment early and often, fail quickly, and use data to measure our progress and inform our next steps. When people are experimenting and failing continuously, it’s no longer failing — it’s learning.<br />
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In both startups that I’ve personally founded, <i>NetPriva</i> and <i>NetMind</i>, my initial business model did not work. I’m not embarrassed about that fact, although I admit I found it stressful at the time. My team and I had to adapt and in both cases we successfully did so, with good returns to our investors. In another startup, <i>Foursticks</i>, we did not adapt quickly enough and we perished.<br />
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‘‘Pivot’’ has become the fashionable term to describe this; it’s overused but it’s a useful metaphor. The ability to adapt quickly and implement new strategies enables businesses to survive. It requires building a culture that not just tolerates change, but thrives in the face of it. In the end it’s that simple: adapt and survive.<br />
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<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Originally appeared in The Australian (paywalled).</span></i></div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-50478478209783028602015-07-22T08:59:00.002+10:002015-07-22T09:00:22.056+10:0010-year technology vision<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Google self-driving car.</i></td></tr>
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yogi_Berra" target="_blank">Yogi Berra</a> said <i>“It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”</i> The rapid pace of technological innovation means that a great deal can happen in 10 years, but it’s equally easy to overstate progress. For example, machine intelligence on par with humans will still be decades away in 2025, although computers will certainly be more powerful, if not intelligent.<br />
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Consider those pocket computers we call smartphones, which are orders of magnitude more powerful than the computers that sent humans to the moon in 1969. Ten years ago neither the iPhone nor Android even existed. Today three-quarters of Australians own smartphones and that figure will rise. Smartphones are just the start of a trend towards “computing everywhere.” In fact, we’re already seeing wearable devices, such as smart watches and head-mounted displays, but expect to see a greatly expanded computing environment, both on ourselves and in our environment. Personal devices will seamlessly interact with the computing environment around us, the so-called Internet of Things (IoT), anticipating our needs and advising us accordingly. <br />
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Innovative software is at the heart of this trend, from low-cost consumer electronics to advanced avionics and automotive applications. Incidentally, this is the reason we need our schools and universities to be producing more graduates with software skills. While Australia will no longer manufacture cars, there is no reason why we cannot be producing the software that goes into them. Google’s <a href="https://www.android.com/auto/" target="_blank">Android Auto</a> product, largely developed in Australia, is one example. In case you think software is just a layer that sits on top of hardware, think again. Software is now <i>defining</i> the very functionality of many products, a trend called <i>“software-defined everything”</i> (SDE). Examples today include software-defined infrastructure (SDI) and software-defined networking (SDN), and in future we’ll have software-defined cars (SDC) and more. By this I mean that vehicles will be entirely configurable by software, which will also define the user experience for drivers, or indeed, non drivers.<br />
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Which brings me to self-driving cars. In 10 years we could well expect to see self-driving cars on Australian roads. Such vehicles will transform our society, and will be particularly beneficial to the elderly and people with disabilities. Cars which can be summoned on demand via an app will reduce the need for car ownership in our cities. These cars will not only transform the taxi industry, but will force us to rethink public transportation and urban design from the ground up.<br />
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And on the subject of cities, ever faster internet access speeds, combined with communications and collaboration technology, means that more people will be able to live and work where they choose. While job opportunities will still matter greatly, lifestyle will become a bigger factor in choosing a place to live. This will bode well for smaller cities such as Adelaide, providing we preserve the attributes that make it a great place to live. It also augurs well for regional Australia. Relatively few Australians shift from cities today, but as our largest cities become megacities, it’s likely that more people will choose to make that sea change, tree change or “vine change.”<br />
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Two other related areas where we can expect to see big improvements in the next 10 years are electric vehicle (EV) and energy storage technology. There will be many more EVs on our roads, but, more importantly, the batteries in all those EVs will increasingly be charged from renewable energy, such as solar. This is because many more Australian homes and businesses will be “micro generators”, capturing, storing and using renewable energy, rather than simply feeding energy back into the grid. Outside of our cities, off-grid living will also become more affordable and more common. <br />
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We’re moving into an age of choice, of change, and of ease - one which could see machines doing all the hard work of optimizing and computing, while freeing humans to do the things we’re really good at - creating, caring, loving and learning. As with any technological and social change, there will be important questions to ask along the way - how is this data being used? What are the tradeoffs being made? But as a technologist, and someone who has worked in and around computer science my whole life, I can’t see the coming decade as anything but a golden age - one that we’ve spent the last decades laying laying the groundwork for. Today, South Australia's tech startup system is small but vibrant, but there is great potential for it to grow over the coming decade. New technologies could lead to a safer, cleaner, greener, and smarter Adelaide - not to mention the rest of the world.<br />
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<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Originally appeared in the Adelaide Sunday Mail (paywalled).</span></i></div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-32266024350509976452015-03-13T16:04:00.001+11:002016-08-07T19:08:56.609+10:00It's code red for a robot regime<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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You might not be able to build a robot. But your kids probably can. And the Australian economy is going to rely on that fact.<br />
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As the world we live in - and the jobs we have - become more digitised, it becomes increasingly important to equip the next generation with the right skills. Around the world, computer science is rapidly becoming a degree of choice as students realise how valuable computational thinking (ie the ability to algorithmically solve complex problems at scale) will be for jobseekers in the 21st Century.<br />
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Globally, more and more students are enrolling in computer science degrees. That’s because it’s a core skill for a digital age. Relatively few of these students will become software engineers - they are just as likely to use their knowledge of coding to become film-makers, CEOs or entrepreneurs. Computational thinking is becoming a necessary skill in careers as intensely analytical as medical research, and as wildly creative as animation. <br />
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In the US, there was a 22% increase in enrolments for undergraduate computer science degrees between 2012 and 2013. China has put a huge effort into creating more computer engineers as it seeks to drive its economy forward (and it is making inroads: a Chinese supercomputer is one of few to have broken the gloriously named petaflop barrier, making it capable of a quadrillion calculations per second).<br />
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So where is Australia in all this? The sad news is we are going backward. Research has shown that there was a 36% decline in the number of students undertaking computer science degrees between 2001 and 2013. Computer science graduates make up just 2% of Australian graduates.<br />
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We have to change this. A strong homegrown technology sector is vital to future Australian jobs and wealth. PwC estimates it could contribute $109 billion and 540,000 jobs by 2033. That’s double the number of jobs the mining sector currently supports. IBM believes that the over the next decade, the internet will have a positive impact on almost one third of Australian GDP, driving growth in areas as diverse as retail, healthcare, and social services. <br />
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That’s where the robots come in. Today and tomorrow, thousands of Aussie high school girls and boys, joined by teams from around Asia, are descending on the FIRST Australia robotics competition at Sydney’s Olympic Park, with robots they have spent the last six weeks building. <br />
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To most adults, the idea of building a robot is incredibly daunting. But kids have a ‘can do attitude’. Just like PE, virtually everyone can give it a go. Importantly, this means both girls and boys. And as parents (and as custodians of the economy our kids will inherit), we owe it to the next generation to drive home the importance of coding.<br />
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The FIRST Australia kids are learning the computational thinking skills that are necessary both for their future - and for Australia’s future. The competition is an opportunity to show our high school kids how exciting it can be to create technology. And to instil in a generation the skills it needs to keep Australia prosperous and growing in a digital age.<br />
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<i>Originally published in the print edition of The Australian.</i></div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-57024735896219863252015-03-07T10:36:00.001+11:002015-03-07T11:23:06.260+11:00Intergenerational report shows why we need to give tech startups a chance<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.au/PublicationsAndMedia/Publications/2015/2015-Intergenerational-Report" target="_blank">Intergenerational Report</a> released this week has no doubt sparked a thousand conversations, with politicians, policy wonks and many organisations sounding the alert that the Australian way of life we know and love is under threat.</div>
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The forecast is that "productivity", which roughly translates to the amount of economic worth generated by working Australians, will grow at just 1.5 per cent over the next four decades, compared to 2.2 per cent during the 1990s.<br />
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Ultimately this means living standards will, in real terms, plunge.<br />
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Moving the dial on the Australian economy has been a challenge for the federal government for generations. But amid the calls for revamped taxation policies, and changes to how workplaces are governed, I have a real fear that we're missing the blindingly obvious.<br />
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Let's get real. The technological revolution has changed the world. We're in an age of <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2014/10/disruptive-technology-trends.html" target="_blank">software-defined everything</a>. The <a href="http://www2.deloitte.com/au/en/pages/building-lucky-country/articles/digital-disruption-harnessing-the-bang.html">reports are already out</a> — digital disruption is threatening 65 per cent of Australia's economy, and tech startups are the catalyst for this disruption. Unless we act quickly, Australia could miss out on creating our own billion-dollar companies that explore global opportunities.<br />
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We must realise our children's livelihoods don't have to be reliant on government taxation or workplace laws. Instead we should be inspiring our youth to take advantage of the world where innovation and creation is the ultimate path to success — tech startups create jobs and wealth at a far greater rate than traditional industries.<br />
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Therefore, it is hugely encouraging to see Treasurer Joe Hockey acknowledge the role of technology to lift productivity.<br />
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What we need next is a strong call from the government for Australia to put its focus on tech startups and innovation. We need to transform into a true knowledge and software-led economy. Building roads and digging up resources is not the only answer.<br />
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A huge part of what we need to do is to inspire and empower more Australians to develop tech skills, and to view entrepreneurship as a valid and worthwhile career choice.<br />
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In the short term, it is vital that immediate action is taken to remove bureaucratic and regulatory hurdles to startups. The government has already begun to face these, most notably taking action in regards to employee share schemes, equity crowdfunding and visas for overseas talent looking to work in Australia's startup eco-system.<br />
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Co-founder of Zeetings and former Yahoo executive Tony Surtees <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/business-it/allow-us-to-fail-tech-startups-should-have-minings-no-liability-status-says-investor-tony-surtees-20150224-13nl17.html">recently called for the government</a> to extend the "<i>no liability structure</i>" — currently limited to mining companies — to all startups. The liability that is currently placed on board members of Australian startups is extremely onerous and out of proportion to the size of the businesses that they oversee. Not only does it force startups to buy additional liability insurance, it usually compels directors to adopt asset protection schemes. It no doubt also discourages many experienced and highly skilled professionals to get involved with tech startups. This shouldn't be the case.<br />
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Starting anything new is a risk. If we are to transform Australia into a country where tech startups are driving up our productivity, we need to encourage entrepreneurs to think global, dream big, and take the leap. If we're willing to provide new mining companies with the regulatory support to take risks, we should also apply this to startups.<br />
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Most importantly, if we want to see an Australia that has a vibrant economy and remains a global leader in 2050 and beyond, we need to look to the future as a place of boundless opportunity, not a place where we are afraid to tread for fear of failure.<br />
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<i>Originally posted on <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/it-opinion/intergenerational-report-shows-why-we-need-to-give-tech-startups-a-chance-20150305-13vrjs.html" target="_blank">the SMH</a>.</i></div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-17509825970949101512014-10-17T23:47:00.003+11:002015-03-07T10:39:26.596+11:00Disruptive technology trends<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Yesterday I spoke to 45 of Australia's leading fund managers as part of lunch series on disruptive technology organized by <a href="http://www.bby.com.au/" target="_blank">BBY</a>. Ask 6 tech prognosticators about tech trends, and you'll get half a dozen different answers. Here's my top five though:<br />
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<b>1. Cloud computing</b><br />
Cloud computing is the marriage of “software as a service” (SaaS) and “utility computing”. The cloud means you can provide services flexibly and affordably, paying as you go, like a utility. First and foremost, the cloud means having access to whatever, wherever and whenever you need it, as products and content are no longer tied down to a single device, i.e., your desktop. While cloud computing is not particularly new, it continues to be interesting as more and more applications and content flow off desktops into the cloud; email, documents, music, videos, and more. For example, <a href="http://www.canva.com/" target="_blank">Canva</a> takes design to the cloud and <a href="http://www.xero.com/" target="_blank">Xero</a> takes accounting. (BTW, I produced the above image with Canva <a href="https://www.canva.com/design/DAA9Vn2vEVs/ZZiaMMWf2mbyEXR76DcaHA/view?utm_campaign=designshare&utm_content=DAA9Vn2vEVs&utm_medium=link&utm_source=v1&cc_from_uid=UAAYpROQTR4" target="_blank">here</a>.) Second, once stuff lives in the cloud, it enables new ways of collaborating that weren't possible previously. For example, real-time, multi-authoring of documents, crowd sourcing, and social networking, etc. are all enabled by the cloud.<br />
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<b>2. Computing everywhere </b><br />
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Computers have come a long way since the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ENIAC" target="_blank">ENIAC</a> in 1946. The first few generations of computers were stationary, or mostly stationary, such as laptops. Smart phones and tablets changed all that, and wearable devices are the next generation. Wearable devices, such as smart watches, smart clothing, <a href="http://www.google.com.au/glass/start/what-it-does/" target="_blank">Google Glass</a>, etc., are creating an expanded computing environment - computing <i>everywhere</i>. Today's wearable devices are basically just companion devices to smart phones, but this will change. Wearable devices will be more pervasive, more capable and more user friendly. With wearable devices the focus will change from being device focused (<i>“e.g., asking my smartphone for the weather”</i> to user focused (<i>“proactively being told about the weather"</i>).</div>
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<b>3. Software-defined everything (SDE)</b></div>
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Software started out as just a way to tame inflexible computer hardware, i.e., as a thin layer on top of hardware. Software still does that of course, in a rather big way. Gartner <a href="http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2696317" target="_blank">reports</a> that the worldwide software industry in 2013 was over US$400B, but that dramatically understates its size. Software is now at heart of everything from low-cost consumer electronics, such as MP3 players, to advanced avionics. It’s no longer just software as a layer though; software is now defining these products.</div>
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Applications and services have also long-been configurable via software, and we have a term for this: <i>application programming interfaces</i> (APIs). APIs are powerful because they enable software developers to create new products on top of the APIs. The <a href="https://developers.google.com/maps/" target="_blank">Google Maps API</a> is a great example of this.<br />
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More recently, software-defined infrastructure (SDI) is infrastructure as a service, fully configurable via software. Similarly, the software-defined data center (SDDC) is a virtualized data center delivered as a service. We've adopted this approach at Google, where we've built highly scalable, fault tolerant data centers from commodity hardware. The smarts is in the software that monitors, adapts and heals the infrastructure. Let's not forget software-defined networking (SDN) either.<br />
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Personally, I'm looking forward to software-defined cars (SDC). Self-driving cars are a step in this direction, but it will get really interesting when everything about the vehicle is configurable for different passengers and different vehicle applications. Tesla is already moving in this direction.<br />
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We’re going to see software-defined approaches in more and more areas, hence software-defined <i>everything</i>.<br />
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<b>4. Big data analytics</b><br />
One consequence of cloud computing is that applications are able to capture increasingly large amounts of data. "Big data" refers to data sets so large and complex that they become difficult to process using traditional data processing techniques. Scientists in many disciplines have been analyzing big data sets for some time, but now advanced analytics has become crucial to all kinds of applications. <a href="http://www.kaggle.com/" target="_blank">Kaggle</a> is an example of a startup that uses big data analytics to solve interesting problems.<br />
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<b>5. Frictionless living</b><br />
My final trend is really a mega trend that is made possible by all of the above. I call it “<i>frictionless living</i>” and it means taking the pain out of everything we do. Any industry in which existing forces resist change has "friction" which means it is prime for disruption. Examples include <a href="http://www.netflix.com/" target="_blank">NetFlix</a> which takes friction out of renting movies, <a href="http://www.gocatch.com/" target="_blank">GoCatch</a> which takes friction out of catching taxies and <a href="https://www.divvy.com.au/" target="_blank">Divvy</a> which takes friction out of parking. </div>
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My list of top tech trends clearly has a big bias towards software. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Andreessen" target="_blank">Marc Andreesen</a> did say that <i>“software is eating the world”</i> though. I agree.</div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-63626263972362454302014-09-12T18:06:00.002+10:002014-09-12T18:07:27.095+10:00Deciding with data<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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When I was a tech entrepreneur striving to build successful businesses, I would rely on data to tell me how products were being used and how they could better meet people’s needs. The insights I gleaned were invaluable in refining and improving features, which ultimately helped my business grow.</div>
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Fast forward to now, and around me at Google every day I see data being used to help solve problems, do things better, or invent completely new things. We call this ‘data-driven innovation’.<br />
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In our lives as consumers, we make use of data-driven innovation every day. When we save ourselves hassle by using an app to see if our bus is running on time, or use Xero personal accounting to figure out where all our money went, we’re getting insights that would have been near-impossible to compute if we were left to our own devices. By gathering information from multiple sources (like buses) and using computing power to analyze them in real-time, we can unlock huge benefits.<br />
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Google asked PwC to look at the role data plays in making Australia’s economy and society more productive and more efficient. The resulting report, <a href="http://www.pwc.com.au/consulting/assets/publications/Data-drive-innovation-Sep14.pdf">“Deciding with data: how data-driven innovation is fuelling growth</a>”, found that:<br />
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<li>In 2013, data-driven innovation added $67 billion in new value to the Australian economy, or 4.4 percent of GDP - making it as big as the retail sector. </li>
<li>Australia has substantial room to improve, and left an estimated $48 billion on the table in potential value from data-driven innovation </li>
<li>Seizing this opportunity will require concerted action, especially by government which accounts for one-third of Australia’s economy </li>
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The report also identifies that the health industry offers the biggest opportunity for Australia to boost data-driven innovation. The sector is not only growing in size and globally competitive, but Australia has the assets, such as good technology and talent, to win.<br />
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The <a href="http://www.mindspot.org.au/">MindSpot Clinic</a> is a shining example of this. It’s a free online mental health clinic that has proven clinical success in using data to assess and treat patients. Three million Australians suffer from mental health problems each year, yet only one in five seek help. A third of MindSpot’s patients have never sought help before, and MindSpot’s smart use of data is improving the productivity of their therapists, and their ability to deliver concrete outcomes for patients. For example, MindSpot uses a detailed questionnaire with new patients which helps to more accurately assess their situation. Then over the course of treatment, MindSpot gathers data about how patients are feeling, which they use to provide appropriate care as and when it’s needed, rather than on a set schedule.<br />
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Working smarter with data to boost productivity and efficiency is a huge opportunity for Australia. This opportunity will require us to achieve a balance between using data for the benefit of society while ensuring that it is managed carefully and respectfully. If we can encourage all Australians to think about how data can help at their home, work, and in society, we will all be better off. That’s something we can count on.<br />
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<i>Originally posted on the <a href="http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2014/09/making-data-work-for-you.html" target="_blank">Google Australia blog</a>.</i></div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-15867326678388901242014-08-01T09:45:00.001+10:002020-04-25T07:53:50.082+10:00Planes, trains and automobiles: A few days in the life of a Google engineering director<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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For something different, I’m writing about what I did this week (so far). <br />
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I took Monday off to take care of some errands. Day off or not, there are always those “urgent” emails to attend to, such as reminding the office of our upcoming voice Fix-it. A “<i>Fix-it</i>” is when Google employees down tools to help improve one of our products, in this case, improve voice search for Google's Australian users. It’s part of Google's “dog-fooding” approach to product development, as in eating our own dogfood.<br />
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My work week started in earnest on Tuesday, with a <a href="http://www.gocatch.com/" target="_blank">GoCatch</a> to the airport and 3-hour flight to the Gold Coast (city #1). There I spoke at the Australian CIO Summit on how even the largest of companies can apply startup thinking to their business. <br />
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Right after my keynote I drove 1 hour up the SE Freeway to Brisbane (city #2) where I dropped in on Steve Baxter, the founder of <a href="http://www.rivercitylabs.net/" target="_blank">River City Labs</a> and a fellow director of <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/" target="_blank">StartupAUS</a>. After a tour of the co-working space, we chatted over coffee about the challenges we face in growing up a startup ecosystem. Next, a drive to the airport through rush-hour traffic, which was surprisingly painless, followed by a 2-hour flight to Canberra (city #3).</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Rainbow over Old Parliament House</i></td></tr>
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Canberra is a very easy city to get around in, so I rented a car, rather than rely on taxis and Ubers. Besides, if you miss a turn, you know there’s another roundabout just up the road to turn around. Canberra is of course Australia’s national capital and is the place to meet politicians and public servants. However my main reason for this visit was to participate in the US Ambassador’s inaugural Innovation Roundtable. My panel was on SMEs, startups and entrepreneurship. That said, one does not go to Canberra without meeting policy movers and shakers, and I had meetings with senior public servants in several government departments. (All very preliminary conversations, so I can’t write about what transpired yet.) I was also interviewed by Waleed Aly for ABC National Radio. Here’s <a href="https://0ccb8d513e031d6516e021845589f684169aa270.googledrive.com/host/0B6krik3dYe13bUQ0YW5XUnRISVU/20140730_Alan_Noble_on_ABC_National_Radio.mp3" target="_blank">the podcast</a>. Then another 2-hour flight and home to Adelaide for the night.<br />
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I worked from home Thursday morning, before GoCatching a taxi to the airport. Next stop, Melbourne (city #4), normally a 1-hour flight from Adelaide, which we compressed to 50 minutes thanks to a strong tail wind. I was in Melbourne to join the panel of episode 1 of “<i>That Startup Show</i>”, a new TV show to explore the trials and tribulations of startups. I took an Uber to the venue, the Savoy Tavern, where the afternoon was spent intermittently in rehearsals and trying clear my growing backlog of emails. Prerecording started at 7:30pm and was over by 9pm, followed by networking to around midnight. The show will compress down to a 30-minute show which will debut <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/TSUShow" target="_blank">on YouTube</a> next week, and hopefully on TV in future.</div>
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I'm up the next morning at 5:30am for a 7am flight, and horror, not a single Uber in all of Melbourne!</div>
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Most disappointing since I had a free voucher from the show organizers to use up. I was about to GoCatch a taxi when a cab pulled up right in front of the hotel.<br />
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Another flight, but the best one of all - the last one for the week. Just enough time to write this blog post en route.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Adelaide from the air. Lovely!</i></td></tr>
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Now it's back to work for me, since it's still only 9:10am on Friday.</div>
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PS Here is my transportation tally for the week:<br />
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Planes: 5<br />
Regular taxis: 3<br />
GoCatches: 2<br />
Rental cars: 2<br />
Ubers: 1<br />
Trains: 1<br />
Buses: 1<br />
Boats: 1</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-67091619500521768462014-06-14T13:37:00.002+10:002014-06-14T13:38:35.299+10:00CS + X: What's your X?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2014/06/vivid-sydney-smart-money.html">Last week</a> I talked at Vivid Sydney about supporting startups in Australia and I mentioned that one surefire way is to produce more Computer Science (CS) graduates. This is because there are more startup founders with CS degrees than any other. But it’s not just startups which need CS graduates; demand is growing globally from all sectors of the economy so that by 2020, global demand will exceed the number of graduates by 1 million jobs (<a href="http://code.org/files/Code.orgOverview.pdf">source</a>).<br />
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So how do we encourage more students to study Computer Science? Honestly, changing the name might help, since the name “<i>Computer Science</i>” sounds a bit intimidating, doesn’t it? Certainly there <i>is</i> a scientific/mathematical basis to CS, but the CS practitioner mostly relies on Computational Thinking (CT) skills. CT includes pattern recognition, pattern abstraction (generalization), modeling, design, and programming (coding). Naturally, these are skills that are needed to create software, through the process of software engineering. What is not as well appreciated is that CT is applicable to more than just software engineering; it is increasingly a critical skill for understanding and using the computing technology that underpins much of our modern society.<br />
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CS has been cosying up to the sciences for a long time, where the term <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_science">computational science</a> is well known. CS + physics = computational physics, CS + chemistry = computational chemistry, CS + biology = bioinformatics, etc. Scientists have merely understood for some time, what everyone else now realizes, and that is that CS combined with another discipline, brings with it new insights and new ways of approaching things. We call this “CS + X”, where “X” can be virtually anything. For example, CS + retail = online shopping, CS + finance = “fin tech” (think online banking, personal finance management, etc.), CS + music = products like “Pandora”, CS + health = fitness products like “Fit Bit”, etc. The opportunities are endless. There’s even an Aussie startup called <i>myEvidence</i> combining CS + crime fighting.<br />
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And therein lies the answer to my earlier question. Students will be a whole lot more excited about studying Computer Science if they can combine it with their passion, their “X.” Universities around the world are starting to recognize this by introducing CS + X programs, where X can be any subject area, not just a science. We need flexible university degrees like this in Australia too. Then we just need to ask students the question, “what’s your “X”?<br />
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For more information on computational thinking and other resources, check out <a href="http://www.google.com.au/campaigns/startwithcode/" target="_blank">google.com.au/startwithcode</a>.</div>
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<i>Originally posted on the <a href="http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2014/06/cs-x-whats-your-x.html" target="_blank">Google Australia blog</a>.</i></div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-78760107418965371802014-06-08T10:04:00.000+10:002014-06-23T12:14:39.164+10:00Vivid Sydney "Smart Money"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The beautiful Sydney Harbour Bridge lit up for Vivid Sydney</i></td></tr>
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On Thursday I spoke at Vivid Sydney “<i>Smart Money</i>” on how to support startups in Australia. The <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/crossroads" target="_blank">StartupAUS “<i>Crossroads</i>” report</a> is full of recommendations but I focused on the following three.<br />
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
1. More entrepreneurs</h3>
The single best thing we can do to support startups is to ensure there is strong availability of talented people, and first and foremost, that means more entrepreneurs. One needs to be careful with terminology, since the dictionary definition of an "entrepreneur" is anyone who starts a new business venture. We need to make a clear distinction between “needs-based entrepreneurship” and “opportunity-based entrepreneurship”.<br />
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The former is typically characterized by small business, whereas latter is high-growth companies with a competitive advantage capable of tackling large, high-value opportunities, i.e., tech startups. By "tech" I include anything where innovative technology provides a competitive advantage.<br />
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The Crossroads report busts the myth that Australia has a high rate of entrepreneurship. While studies like the “Global Entrepreneurship Monitor” report that over 1 in 10 adult Aussies are actively engaged in starting a business, a rate which is second only to the US, the definition is too broad.<br />
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We know that 20% of students who participate in entrepreneurship training in high school will one day start their own company. Unfortunately most students do not receive any form of entrepreneurship education in primary school, high school or university. Australia currently has 7 excellent university student startup incubators, and they’re supporting about 150 students annually. That's 1 in 8000 of the 1.2 million students currently enrolled at Australian universities. We need this ratio to be more like 1 in 50, which would mean 24,000 new entrepreneurs every year from university grads alone.<br />
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So how do we increase the number of tech entrepreneurs?<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Firstly, we need to dramatically raise awareness about the possibilities. Most Aussies hardly know what a tech entrepreneur is, let alone want to aspire to become one. We need to change that. </li>
<li>Second, we should create scholarships for young entrepreneurs. This is something that <i>StartupAUS</i> intends to pursue.</li>
<li>Thirdly, we need incentives for researchers to start companies. Not all will be interested in doing so, but we need to strongly encourage the ones that do, for example, with “entrepreneurial leave”.</li>
<li>Fourthly, we need to attract more foreign entrepreneurs. <i>StartupAUS</i> recommends an entrepreneurship visa to streamline the process.</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
2. Improve the quality and quantity of entrepreneurship education</h3>
So we clearly to increase the quantity of entrepreneurs, but we also need to increase the <i>quality</i>. To do this we need national program of entrepreneurship education across primary, secondary and tertiary institutions. After all, entrepreneurial skills are useful career skills, regardless of whether or not one ever starts a company, or joins a startup.<br />
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Teaching entrepreneurship is more than formal education though; it’s also about culture. What often holds back aspiring entrepreneurs is fear of failure. Any significant innovation naturally carries with it the risk of failure. Entrepreneurs in America, and particularly in Silicon Valley, embrace this. The great thing about the Valley is that failure is only ever temporary. Providing you fail honorably - ethically - you're considered “experienced”.<br />
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We need to develop this type of tolerance of failure here in Australia too. We also need to understand that failure doesn't have to be expensive and slow; it can be cheap and fast. If we can create a culture where bringing one's mistakes to the table every week is normal, it feels less like failing and more like learning.<br />
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
3. Increase the number of people with computer science skills</h3>
Computer Science (CS) is the most prevalent university degree among founders of tech startups, not MBAs or other business degrees. In Australia, 30% of tech startup founder have CS degrees and in Silicon Valley it is even higher. Yet only 2% of Australian university graduates have any kind of ICT qualification.<br />
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So if we want to have more tech startups, we need more founders with CS skills.<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>The very first thing we need to do across Australia is get on with implementing the <i>Digital Technologies Curriculum</i>.</li>
<li>The second thing is to encourage more students to pursue CS degrees at university. Combining CS with another discipline is even better. We call this “CS + X”. Combining CS with real-world problems, like crisis management and climate change, or one's passion - one's "X" - such as art or industrial design, is a sure way to engage students.</li>
<li>Thirdly, we need to relax restrictions on 457 visas for startups. I’m not talking 457s for hairdressers; I’m talking software engineers, user experience designers, product managers, etc.</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
Summary</h3>
I’ve focused talked about people, skills and culture. What about angels, venture capital, incubators, accelerators, regulations? Yes, there are many ingredients that go into a successful startup ecosystem. The ecosystem is an interconnected community of startups, service providers, educational institutions, investors, policy makers, large companies and more.<br />
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But whether it is an individual, a startup or the entire startup community, people and culture make all the difference.</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-87408932424677332392014-04-15T17:09:00.000+10:002014-04-15T17:09:08.293+10:00StartupAUS Crossroads report launches<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Today <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/" target="_blank">StartupAUS</a> launched the <i>Crossroads</i> report which you can find <a href="http://startupaus.org/crossroads/" target="_blank">here</a>. The name of the report comes from the opening paragraph, which I quote:</div>
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<i>Australia is at a crossroads. We have an unprecedented opportunity to transition from an economy based on resources, primary industries and domestically focused businesses to one based on high- growth knowledge-intensive businesses that can compete globally in an increasingly technology- driven world.</i></blockquote>
The report highlights a number of key issues facing Australia: <br /><ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Australia’s startup sector is maturing at a slower rate than many other nations. </li>
<li>High-growth tech companies could contribute 4% of the nation’s GDP by 2033, compared to just 0.2% today. This would add 540,000 jobs to the economy. </li>
<li>In 2013, Australia invested just $4.5 per capita in Venture Capital for start-ups compared to $120 in Israel, $85 in the US, $20 in South Korea and $15 in the UK.</li>
</ul>
The last stat is quite alarming. Put another way, on <u>one</u> day of the year Australians bet more on the Melbourne Cup ($200m in total or $9 per capita) than the entire Australian venture capital industry invests in startups in a year!<div class="page" title="Page 53">
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The report is the most comprehensive assessment of Australia's tech startup sector to date, and there is far too much content to summarize in a single blog post. Nevertheless, some of the key takeaways are:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Startups can help diversify and boost Australia’s national economy yet we invest far less than other countries in backing them </li>
<li>If Australia doesn’t take steps to accelerate the emergence of a strong startup eco-system we will lose out in so many ways. The time to act is now, before Australia falls further behind our global competitors in the startup space. </li>
<li>It is not just about throwing government money at the problem, what we need are some prudent but effective steps by government, and leadership by Federal government.</li>
</ul>
There are many recommendations however that do not require government action, where the startup community itself can drive change. Once such example is the expansion of <i>Startup Spring</i> – an annual program of profile-raising events organized by StartupAUS. The inaugural Startup Spring held in September 2013 incorporated 160 events in nine Australian cities, engaged 6,500 people and was covered in over 100 media articles. Let's make it even bigger and better in 2014!</div>
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I strongly encourage you to read the report. I encourage you even more to get involved!</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-77859964213074526612014-03-24T18:45:00.001+11:002014-03-24T18:47:05.066+11:00Start with Code, Australia!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Australia has a long, proud history of invention. Bright, inquisitive Australians are fond of asking themselves <i>“how could I make the world better, and people’s lives easier?”</i> From these questions have sprung inventions from the boomerang to Wifi to Google Maps.<br />
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In the past, invention was possible with a can-do attitude and a healthy disregard for the impossible. But in the future, we will need to add one new ingredient to this mix - the ability to code.<br />
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Future invention and innovation across every sector will have technology and computational thinking at their heart. <a href="https://www.google.com/edu/computational-thinking/" target="_blank">Computational thinking</a> is not just a fancy way of saying “think like a computer”. It’s an approach to problem solving that sits at the heart of computer science, and can unlock huge potential across all industries. Computational thinking underpins the belief that today’s computing powers will be able to tackle a variety of problems in new ways. For example, scientists looking for cures won’t solely rely on the lab and test tube. They’ll crunch masses of data, looking for patterns and answers and applying new problem solving approaches - and that will require computational thinking!<br />
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We want to see Australia’s young people make the most of these opportunities, and combine their area of passion with coding skills to step into exciting future jobs in everything from medicine to manufacturing to movies. That’s why we’re launching a new campaign and website, <a href="http://www.google.com.au/campaigns/startwithcode/" target="_blank">Start with Code</a>, to inspire our inventors of the future to arm themselves with coding skills today. It’s full of resources for parents, teachers, and students, to help people take their first coding steps. And we’ll add to it over time as we partner with more organisations in Australia who share our belief in Australia’s bright tech future.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/THEpcW7vFkc?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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We’ve also put together a book of stories about the people who are doing great things in coding and entrepreneurship today. <a href="http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com.au/en/au/campaigns/startwithcode/assets/Start_with_Code_Booklet_Online.pdf" target="_blank">Australia’s Innovation Generation</a> profiles 10 Australians making waves here and abroad thanks to their big thinking and creative approaches.<br />
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Wouldn’t it be amazing if the next Tesla Motors, iRobots, Twitters and Googles were founded in Australia? We believe that, with the right attitude to skills and innovation, we can create an Australia of new, high-value jobs, and in doing so, create a bright future for our talented young people. The first step? Start with code!<br />
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<i>Originally posted on the Google Australia blog.</i></div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-36127280104609613622013-10-05T10:45:00.004+10:002013-10-06T09:55:59.022+11:00Have a go! It's never been a better time to be an entrepreneur<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The difference between a big idea and actually making it big is the decision to have a go. Unless you take that the first step, and commit to it fully, all the great ideas in the world won’t matter. Yet I meet many aspiring entrepreneurs who tell me they are not quite ready to take that first step. Here are 6 common reasons I hear, and why I think they are really just excuses.</div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
Excuse #1: I’m not sure about my idea</h3>
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<span id="docs-internal-guid-026e48b2-85da-5c53-7150-94c17c9bbfcc">If you’re uncertain about your idea, you have a few choices. First ask yourself this question. Do you believe in your idea? Guess what? If you don’t believe in it, no one else will!<br /><br />Suppose you do believe in your great idea, but you’re not sure others do. Then test it with potential users or customers, and test it early, before expending much time and money. Some say that testing an idea by bouncing it off a few, well-informed mentors is sufficient, but I think the very best way to test an idea is to build a quick proof of concept and measure the results.<br /><br />Or perhaps your idea is interesting, but not big enough. If so, reshape your idea to make it bigger, hairier, more audacious. Albert Einstein said <i>“If at first, the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.”</i> Put another way, “go big or go home”. As a bonus, the bigger you go, the more inspired you'll be and the easier it will be to attract others people to join your mission.</span><br />
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Excuse #2: I don’t know enough</h3>
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Perhaps you have a technical background and worry you don’t know enough about business. Or perhaps you have a non-technical background and worry you don’t know enough about tech. Or perhaps you simply feel "unqualified” because your idea involves doing something in another industry.</span></div>
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You should never be afraid to do something because you feel "unqualified”. I’m not saying you shouldn't try to plug your knowledge gaps. What I am saying is that you’ll most likely you'll succeed by being more bold and more creative, not by knowing more than others or being more "qualified".<br />
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Excuse #3: I need more money</h3>
There’s a perception that one always needs to raise capital in order to start a company. In reality, chasing funding is often the last thing entrepreneurs should be worrying about. Capital-light businesses, such as online businesses, can often be bootstrapped with very modest funds from friends and family or even tapping into a credit card. So build that proof of concept to validate the idea, and get some real users. Then, and only then, seek capital.</div>
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Excuse #4: I need more people</h3>
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This is most likely a variation on Excuse #2, i.e., I'm not technical and I need a technical co-founder, or I am technical and I need a business co-founder. If you’re non-technical, actually, you don’t need a technical co-founder right away. There are accelerators that you can supply you with technical expertise. And, if you’re technical, you have absolutely no excuse; just get on with it.</div>
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Excuse #5: I need more time</h3>
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Ask yourself, why do you need more time? Is it because you have a day job and you're not 100% committed to your startup idea? If so, see Excuse #1.<br />
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Or is it because you feel you don’t know enough? If so, see Excuse #2. </div>
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Excuse #6: I might fail</h3>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuvclvdvR-ginYy2DLJBybXp3TNicciwHVO8h3yzFspf66rY2StfL-Xr7Kxt32a4G6b3VbF3RW4_YVJMud59LuS5Eg2mlq8u2iHQdmt8vOa1PN6bWnF5Yr448e5x3XGpsdFZ_2CI-SNrxZ/s1600/%236_Fail.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuvclvdvR-ginYy2DLJBybXp3TNicciwHVO8h3yzFspf66rY2StfL-Xr7Kxt32a4G6b3VbF3RW4_YVJMud59LuS5Eg2mlq8u2iHQdmt8vOa1PN6bWnF5Yr448e5x3XGpsdFZ_2CI-SNrxZ/s320/%236_Fail.png" width="320" /></a>Fear of failure is the most insidious excuse. Yes, you might fail. Innovation is essentially an experiment and, as with any experiment, it carries with it the risk of failure. <br />
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You need to overcome fear of failing. Successful entrepreneurs do, and they learn from their failures.<br />
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Besides, true failure comes only when you don’t push yourself to the limit. If you give something your very best and don’t succeed, that’s nothing to be ashamed of. For the ideas that don’t work out, admit it, learn the lessons, adapt and move on.<br />
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<span style="text-align: center;">It has never been a better time to be an entrepreneur. Get out there and have a go!</span><br />
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PS My tips for entrepreneurs for <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/tips-for-entrepreneurs-starting-out.html" target="">starting out</a> and <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2012/11/tips-for-entrepreneurs-execution.html" target="">executing</a>.</div>
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<i>Taken from a keynote I gave at <a href="http://southstart.com.au/" target="_blank">South Start 2013</a>.</i></div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-36032303688366627132013-09-22T00:57:00.000+10:002014-05-13T08:05:48.640+10:00StartupAUS launches Startup Spring<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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In May I co-founded the not-for-profit <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/">StartupAUS</a> with Peter Bradd (<a href="http://fishburners.org/" target="_blank">Fishburners</a>) and Bill Bartee (<a href="http://www.sxvp.com/" target="_blank">Southern Cross Venture Partners</a>), and later joined by Stephen Baxter (<a href="http://www.rivercitylabs.net/" target="_blank">River City Labs</a>). Actually, those are my co-founders only in the narrow, fiduciary sense, because StartupAUS was really co-founded by everyone who attended the Aussie <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com/2013/03/starting-up-startupaus.html" target="_blank">startup roundtable</a> held in March 2013. It just took us a while to incorporate, etc.<br />
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Our mission is to foster and build the community of technology entrepreneurship in Australia. We believe that creating greater awareness of the tech startup sector is an important part of that mission. With that goal in mind, earlier this week we launched Australia's first startup festival, <a href="http://www.startupspring2013.org/">Startup Spring</a>, a three-week long, Australia-wide festival of over 150 independently-organised events and activities, coordinated by StartupAUS. After all, if Aussies can celebrate food, wine and music with festivals, why not startups?<br />
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So whether you’re contemplating taking the leap with your first startup, an experienced entrepreneur, or just curious to find out more, we think there’s something for almost everyone.<br />
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PS Here are some of my recent interviews on StartupAUS and Startup Spring:<br />
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<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fg78PM2ELWs" target="_blank">TV interview</a> with Nigel Freitas on Sky News Business Today. </li>
<li><a href="https://googledrive.com/host/0B6krik3dYe13bUQ0YW5XUnRISVU/20130921_Alan_Noble_on_Perth_720_ABC_with_James_Lush.mp3" target="_blank">Radio interview</a> with James Lush on 720 ABC Perth.</li>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-73962849421183034662013-08-13T08:55:00.001+10:002013-08-13T09:40:24.139+10:00Preparing today for tomorrow's jobs<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Stop any Australian on the street tomorrow and ask them about the biggest issue in Australian education right now, and chances are they’ll say “Gonski”. School funding reform has dominated headlines for months now, and rightfully so; it’s a hugely important issue, and well-resourced schools are something we can all get behind.<br />
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But with both major political parties now broadly agreeing to the Gonski principles, the conversation must move to the questions of what we will teach our young people, and how our curriculum will prepare them for the jobs they’ll be graduating into in 16 years time.<br />
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The world is changing so fast that we simply don’t know what well-paid, secure jobs will look like 16 years from now. Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter didn’t exist 16 years ago, and so there’s no doubt that many of the jobs of 2028 don’t exist in any form today.<br />
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While we can’t see the future in detail, we do know that it’s going to rely deeply on technology, and so the best thing we can do is prepare our young people with the kind of skills and thinking that they’ll need to adapt to this fast-changing world.<br />
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When I was growing up in Adelaide, it was thought by many that a law degree was a smart thing to do even if you had no intention of being a lawyer, because it showed you were smart, hard-working, and could think systematically. It was as much foundational as vocational.<br />
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In my view, the computer science degree is today’s version of the law degree. Programming languages will change and evolve, but the ability to think computationally—using skills like pattern recognition, problem solving, abstraction, and design—will show that you can think and learn in a way that can be applied to many areas. And that will set young people up for these jobs that don’t exist yet.<br />
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In the future, today’s separation between technology and other industries is going to blur, as programming and computer science mix with other areas and create exciting new fields and industries. Computer science + a wristband gave us Fuel Band. Computer science + a camera gave us instagram. Computer science + art gave us movies like Avatar and The Hobbit. Computer science + your child’s area of interest might lead to an exciting career that could change lives and change the world<br />
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This is new and scary for most parents! If you’re (like me) older than 40, you probably grew up thinking that computing was a niche skill for geeks with thick-glasses, doing isolated and boring jobs sitting in front of blinking monitors with pocket protectors … and let’s face it, in many circles the old stereotype of ‘IT’ is still alive and well. No wonder most parents of my generation are still recommending that their kids go into familiar, safe, ‘fun’ careers like law, medicine, accounting.<br />
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Meanwhile, today’s software engineers are among the most sought after employees in the world, lavished with perks by technology companies, working in bright, colourful, social offices, wearing hoodies and flip flops to work. We have about 200 of them in Sydney, and we simply can’t hire enough to meet our needs. These kids are rock stars, and their jobs couldn’t be further from low-level work managing a database. Frankly computer science is the smart choice for kids and their parents. And yet, Australian students with tertiary Computer Science skills are actually falling in number and make up just two percent of total of domestic graduates.<br />
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The Office of the Chief Scientist recently issued a position paper on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics in the National Interest. The paper opened by saying: <i>The reality is that we can’t relax. We can’t be complacent. There can be no sense of entitlement. We must understand that we will get the future we earn</i>. I couldn’t agree more with that statement, and the overall sentiments of the position paper. But in my view, it didn’t go far enough. STEM is still a huge set of subjects, incorporating everything from geography to civil engineering to biology. I would love to see Australia put a laser focus on computer science in the same way New Zealand, the UK and The Netherlands have done.<br />
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The proposed 2014 Digital Technologies curriculum is a big step in the right direction. Successfully implemented in schools across the nation, and taught by passionate teachers, it will be an important first step in preparing students to become the creators and innovators of the future. But once it’s up and running and teachers are comfortable with it, we think it could go further. We could show real leadership on a world stage by making Digital Technologies a required subject from Foundation to Year 10. We could go a step further by by making sure the curriculum provides instruction in at least one general programming language.<br />
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At a micro-level, strengthening computer science in our schools is about individual careers, but at a macro-level, it’s about the wealth of our country and the economic prospects of our children and grandchildren. The technology startup sector alone in Australia has the capacity to contribute $109 billion directly to GDP and create 540,000 new jobs by 2033. A technology-literate workforce is the key to unlocking this value.<br />
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We need to equip our young people to be future creators, not just consumers, of technology. So let’s make sure that as a nation, we use the focus that Gonski has put on education to help our kids—and their parents—make smart choices that equip them well for the jobs of the future.<br />
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<i>Originally posted as <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/opinion/start-preparing-today-for-tomorrows-jobs/story-e6frgb0o-1226695812923" target="_blank">an opinion piece</a> in The Australian (paywalled).</i></div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-59421009312381450442013-05-02T17:33:00.002+10:002013-05-03T07:48:20.341+10:00Advance Innovation Summit: Creative thinking and innovationLast week I attended part of the <a href="http://advance.org/" target="_blank">Advance</a> Innovation Summit, in Mountain View, California. I was on a panel which explored the topic of <i>"building a culture that supports creative thinking and innovation"</i>, moderated by <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sarah-backhouse/0/b5b/749">Sarah Backhouse</a> (Founder Future 360). I was joined by <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andrew-andy-mckeon/1/857/87a">Andy McKeon</a> (Facebook), <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/tom-bassett/5/560/308/">Tom Bassett</a> (Mindswarms), and <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/eric-fleming/17/b91/b88">Eric Fleming</a> (Fleming Job Hall).<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Co-panelists Eric, Tom, Andy and Sarah (left to right).</i></td></tr>
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<i>Way</i> too many factors contribute to creative thinking to cover here; and numerous books have been written on the subject. For example, I'm quite partial to long soaks in my hot tub, but obviously that is not for everyone! However, based on my experience working in companies of all shapes and sizes, certain organisational cultures seem to foster creativity and innovation more than others.<br />
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First and foremost, because creative ideas can come from anyone and anywhere, it's crucial to establish a culture of trust in which ideas can flourish, regardless of their origin. Meritocracies, which place a premium on the idea (the message) vs. the person (the messenger), therefore work best. Crucially, the "membership" of the meritocracy must be open to all, not just an elite or a subset of the population, which leads to inclusion. Creative cultures value inclusion and strive for organisational diversity that mirrors society at large. Finally, organisational transparency is really important too, because it makes is easier to both uncover new opportunities and to act upon them.<br />
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These factors that support creative thinking are not, alone, sufficient to drive innovation, i.e., the creation of new things or new processes. Innovation thrives in cultures that make it easy to test new ideas quickly. With software and other virtual goods, often the best way to test a new idea is to implement it - or a prototype - and launch it. Then improve upon it; or kill it. The latter, as I've written about previously, means embracing "failure", i.e., thinking of failure not as a bad thing, but as a chance to learn.<br />
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Another thing that the panel all agreed on was the critical role of founders. Culture must be designed, not left to chance, and the organisation's founders set the tone.<br />
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Other than my panel - which was of course excellent - I also enjoyed the other sessions that I attended. In particular, it was fascinating hearing from Redbull Director of High Performance, <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andy-walshe/8/896/b41" target="_blank">Dr. Andy Walshe</a>, on how Redbull extracts top performance from its athletes. It was particularly interesting to learn how Redbull sends their top athletes to Cirque du Soleil, both to push them out of their comfort zones and to enable them to explore their creative sides.<br />
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Incidentally, Eric Fleming has written a great little book called "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Think-About-Purple-Elephants/dp/1466257636" target="_blank">Don't Think About Purple Elephants</a>" which I thoroughly recommend. It's a quick read that reminds us of the power of positive thinking.</div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-17139278627275649102013-04-23T17:00:00.002+10:002013-04-23T17:00:43.463+10:00The Australian Startup Economy<br />
A strong homegrown tech sector is vital to future Australian jobs and wealth. Australians are great consumer of technology, but it’s only through becoming a nation of creators - of tech innovators - that will we will be able to compete in an increasingly global and connected world.<br />
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As part of Google’s goal of helping build an innovation generation in Australia, today we released <i>"The Startup Economy</i>". <a href="http://www.digitalpulse.pwc.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/PwC-Google-The-startup-economy-2013.pdf" target="_blank">This report</a>, prepared by PwC, looks into the state of the Aussie tech sector, with a roadmap of how we can build a strong technology industry for the country.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Location of today's Australian startups.</i></td></tr>
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<b>Our tech sector is small, but growing fast</b><br />
There are currently around 1,500 tech startups in Australia, with major hubs in Sydney and Melbourne. What PwC also found is that the sector is growing fast, with the majority of startups founded less than five years ago. A flourishing ecosystem is also developing as incubators, co-working spaces, angel investors and venture capitalists are being set up to support entrepreneurs.<br />
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<b>The opportunity is big</b><br />
The tech startup sector has the ability to grow into an important part of Australia’s economy, providing a significant number of jobs of the future. PwC found that by 2033, the industry has the potential to reach $109bn or 4% to the economy and employ more than 540,000 people.<br />
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<b>But unlocking this vast potential will take work</b><br />
A successful Australian tech sector will take a concerted effort that includes entrepreneurs fostering a more open and inclusive culture, boosting the number of people founding companies, increasing success rates, and ensuring students are taught computer science at an earlier age.<br />
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This report will be used to help us and <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/" target="_blank">startupAUS</a>, a newly-formed group representing the industry, to help improve the environment for startups; and ultimately making their success and growth a national imperative for Australia.<br />
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In the short term it’s estimated we’ll need to have 2,000 more tech entrepreneurs drawn from the existing workforce each year. My hope for the long term is that success will breed success. If we get things right, the opportunities that a high school graduate will have in 2033 will be vastly different - indeed, better - than today.<br />
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<i>Originally posted on the <a href="http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/the-startup-economy-roadmap-to.html" target="_blank">Google Australia Blog</a>.</i><br />
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-81326301209782200932013-04-10T12:35:00.000+10:002013-04-16T13:13:21.955+10:00Moonshot thinking<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Solve for X</i></td></tr>
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Last weekend I spoke at the inaugural <a href="http://www.makerfaireadelaide.com/" target="_blank">Adelaide Maker Faire</a> on the topic of "moonshots". By moonshots, I mean <b>huge</b> problems, albeit relatively well-defined ones, in need of a <b>radical</b>, even science-fiction-like, solutions. There also needs to be some sense of <b>breakthrough</b> <b>technology</b> that makes the solution possible to achieve. Although it sounds counter intuitive, making something 10x better may be easier to achieve than making it 10% better. If you’re just aiming for 10% better, you invariably end up using existing tools and assumptions and have to make progress through sheer effort. Whereas if you shoot for 10x, it forces you to start over, question all the assumptions, change everything, etc.</div>
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For example, if you want to make a fuel-efficient car that burns 1 litre of fossil fuel per 100km, you can probably retool existing technologies. But if your goal is a car that uses only 1 litre per 1000km, you will need to start over. Or even better, make a car than runs on a portable form of renewable energy!</div>
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There’s never been a better time for any one of us to have a big impact on the problems we care about, either as individuals and as groups, so let me share some habits to encourage moonshot thinking.</div>
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Firstly, <b>be curious</b>. Rediscover that natural spirit we all possessed as children: wonder, curiosity, asking “why” and “why not?”. Those zany, unsettling questions often lead to new ways of thinking.<br />
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Secondly, <b>go big or go home</b>, i.e., restate the question you’re trying to answer by making it bigger; and give it your all, or don’t bother. As a bonus, the bigger you go go, the more inspired you'll be and the easier it will be to attract other people to join your cause.<br />
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Thirdly, <b>step out of your comfort zone</b>. Don’t be afraid to do something in another industry; don’t worry about trying things for which you feel "unqualified." Most likely you'll succeed by being more bold and more creative, not by knowing more than others or being more "qualified". As a bonus, because you’re the newcomer with zany ideas, you’ll be the underdog; and as anyone who’s ever played on the underdog team, you know that it’s more fun being the underdog.<br />
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Fourthly, <b>get connected</b>. A big part of moonshot thinking is about lighting a fire in other people, helping them see that the “impossible” might well be possible. They’ll be inspired to pitch in or embark upon their own moonshots. People around the world have never been more connected, so anyone, no matter where they are, can have an impact on a cause, and find and join a community they care about. Seek out forums, such as <a href="https://www.solveforx.com/" target="_blank">SolveforX</a>, that encourage moonshot thinking and collaboration.<br />
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The original Apollo moonshot inspired and galvanized a nation at every level, and stood as inspiration for generations of kids around the world - myself included. No one knew how to put a man on the Moon in 1961, but only 8 years later they achieved it. If we become afraid to take great big risks, we stop inspiring people and achieving great things.<br />
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Go out and discover your own moonshot!</div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-32127554379178541752013-03-25T11:21:00.000+11:002013-04-10T13:54:43.502+10:00Growth championsLast week I attended part of Telstra's annual CIO Forum, to participate on a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Robertson" target="_blank">Geoffrey Robertson</a> "Hypothetical" panel. On the panel we explored the hypothetical business and moral dilemmas confronting a fictitious startup company, "Clever Corp," which had just invented a box capable of producing an instant, personalized health report, including complete disease prognoses, based on a saliva sample from the user. (Incidentally, this product is not much more futuristic than what <a href="http://www.23andme.com/" target="_blank">23andMe.com</a> are already doing, albeit in the lab). I was in illustrious company with David Thodey (Telstra CEO), Anna Bligh (former Queensland premier), Graeme Samuel (former ACCC chief), and others. The hypothetical was both stimulating and entertaining - it's a pity it was not recorded.<br />
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<i>Geoffrey Robertson hosting a hypothetical on "Clever Corp". </i></div>
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The theme of the CIO Forum was "towards a clever Australia", which coincided with the release of <a href="http://www.telstra.com.au/business-enterprise/resources-insights/clever-australia-report/reports/" target="_blank">this eponymous report by Telstra</a>. The report identifies a small subset of companies - about 5% of those surveyed - named "growth champions", that have achieved both substantial productivity improvements <i>and</i> substantial growth over the past 12 months. Many established companies achieve one or the other, but few achieve both.<br />
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The success of growth champions is attributed to 3 things:</div>
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<li>putting the customer first,</li>
<li>employee collaboration, and </li>
<li>investing in technology. </li>
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Doing these things right pays off with innovations which in turn drive growth and productivity. These companies are also big into metrics so they can measure improvements.<br />
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Although startups were not studied in the report, the best-run startups naturally espouse the attributes of a growth champion. As result, existing businesses that don't embrace these principles may well find startups challenging them in the not-to-distant future; just as "Clever Corp" challenged the entire medical industry :-)</div>
<br />Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-18300335733670041602013-03-19T11:24:00.003+11:002013-09-24T18:14:12.695+10:00Starting up StartupAUS<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Australia’s are great consumers of technology, but how do we become the creators of it? As a nation of only 23 million people, becoming a nation of creators - of innovators - will greatly help the future of Australian jobs, education and our economy.<br />
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Last week close to 50 members of Australia’s tech startup community got together to work out how we can ensure our country has a vibrant tech ecosystem. Dubbed<b> StartupAUS</b>, everything was on the table as we shared stories about the challenges and opportunities of becoming a tech entrepreneurs in our country.<br />
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We heard from <a href="http://freelancer.com/">Freelancer.com</a> and <a href="http://www.shoesofprey.com/">Shoes of Prey</a> about how difficult it is to find enough software engineers with the right skills to help grow their businesses. While Google may have more resources to ensure we’re attracting the best and brightest that our universities produce, we also understand it’s a numbers game. Local graduates in computer science have shrunk significantly over the last decade and we all agreed that it’s a national imperative to fix this. On a practical level, this means giving more high school students the opportunity to learn computer science at an earlier age and that teachers are supported. Those at the summit put in a lot of time working out how.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN-xC8gkic9Tq53njGX-Ux21a3L52Y9YyYMAwk6OfPe2YV1WwH0yHvaEs7FbRT-iiSmHyrdDL_5DGB4CAr26-r3w257_4YcPJj-_zm28RXhtWG4X8AmcPGs-Ww7M_JMRsX83L9w4bPEupK/s1600/startupAUS+-+Group+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN-xC8gkic9Tq53njGX-Ux21a3L52Y9YyYMAwk6OfPe2YV1WwH0yHvaEs7FbRT-iiSmHyrdDL_5DGB4CAr26-r3w257_4YcPJj-_zm28RXhtWG4X8AmcPGs-Ww7M_JMRsX83L9w4bPEupK/s400/startupAUS+-+Group+1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: arial; font-size: xx-small; text-align: start;"><i>Participants of the #startUpAUS summit</i></span></td></tr>
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As part of our efforts, we recently commissioned PwC to help paint a picture of Australia tech startup scene. It’s a tough and ambitious task in such a fast moving and new industry, but they’ve begun <a href="http://startupaus.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/getting-data-on-startups-first-cut.html">mapping existing Aussie startups</a> and are looking into the ingredients <a href="http://startupaus.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/startup-ecosystem-growth-theories.html">needed for a vibrant ecosystem</a>. This data will be used to help the group’s other areas of focus on boosting awareness of the tech sector, and helping to improve the environment for startups.<br />
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In one sense <b>StartupAUS</b> is itself a startup. And as with any new venture, there’s lots of ideas, energy and aspiration. For me, the real test will occur when a high school student has that<i> “what do you want to be when you grow up”</i> conversation with his or her parents. My idea of success: instead of being told to be a doctor or a lawyer, parents will ask, <i>“have you ever considered a career in computer science?”</i>.<br />
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<i>Originally posted on the <a href="http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/starting-up-startupaus.html" target="_blank">Google Australia Blog</a>.</i><br />
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PS StartupAUS now has a <a href="http://www.startupaus.org/" target="_blank">web site</a>.</div>
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-725030770279099482013-02-24T00:49:00.000+11:002013-02-24T15:14:25.227+11:00On creativity, technology and kitesurfing<br />
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I just got back from beautiful Margaret River, Western Australia, where I attended the inaugural <a href="http://www.emergencecreative.com/" target="_blank">Emergence Creative Festival</a>. I was also fortunate to participate in <a href="http://www.maitaiglobal.org/" target="_blank">Mai Tai</a>, a kitesurfing camp for entrepreneurs, innovators and athletes, started by elite kitesurfer, Susi Mai, and kitesurfing venture capitalist, Bill Tai. </div>
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At the festival I was on a panel that explored the topic of <i>"Collision of creativity and technology."</i> The word "collision" struck me as incongruous, since I believe that creativity and technology don't collide so much as harmonize. And they do so in several ways:</div>
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Firstly, there is creativity that is embodied in technology. Software is the quintessential example; developing software is incredibly creative, and at the same time it <i>is</i> undeniably technology. Animation is another such example.</div>
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Secondly, there is creativity, or creative content, leveraging technology as a distribution channel. For example, YouTube for film, iTunes for music, blogs for art, social media for engagement, etc.</div>
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Thirdly, there is creativity as a magnet and/or catalyst for technology. Creative people love to experience things, simply because it gets their creative juices flowing; whether it's art or music, coffee or wine, and more. So towns and cities that are creative hot spots in one area, are more likely to be attractive to others, including technologists and engineers. In other words, whether people create technology or creative content or both, they like to live in interesting places and do interesting things. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Image by <a href="http://blog.velanoble.com/" target="_blank">Vela</a></i></td></tr>
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Which brings me to my next point, kitesurfing. Kitesurfing (or kiteboarding), considered an extreme support, is definitely one of those experiential activities that seems to attract the type of person who loves a thrill, who is comfortable taking some risks, i.e., doesn't mind crashing sometimes, and who is also quick to adapt to opportunities. Perhaps it's not surprising then that so many innovators and entrepreneurs enjoy the sport. The common risks in kitesurfing, notably a bad launch or landing, can be mitigated with good planning and skill, although never completely eliminated. Kitesurfing, although a solo sport, also teaches the value of teamwork, since launching and landing are much safer with a friend to assist, particularly when learning. This is not true of kitesurfing's predecessor, windsurfing. Finally, kitesurfing is a relatively new sport and its technology has been evolving rapidly.</div>
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Bringing Emergence Creative and Mai Tai together in Margaret River was a stroke of genius and I look forward to my next trip.</div>
Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-75031989901315697542013-02-20T22:02:00.000+11:002013-02-21T11:53:38.529+11:00When open data is not enough<br />
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Last night I spoke in Canberra at the annual <a href="http://tern.org.au/" target="_blank">TERN</a> Symposium (#TERN2013) on the topic of open data and open science. I started with the premise that public sector information (PSI) and, and it's sibling, publicly-funded information (PFI), are national assets - <i>national information assets</i> to be precise. <span class="s1"> </span>Like any other valuable resource, especially one that taxpayers have funded, we need to optimize its economic and social value. And the best way to do this is by making it openly available to all citizens. This is what I mean by <b>open data</b>.</div>
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I firmly believe that today's data will spur tomorrow’s innovations. Google Earth is a great example. If the US government had not put satellite image data into the public domain, there would be no Google Earth, nor the myriad innovations that it spurred. Another example of the power of open data is in the area of emergency services. Private companies, such as Google, can reshare emergency information for the benefit of the public, and make it more easily discoverable, providing the data is open. All of this is only possible though if the data is made available <i>ahead of time </i>with sufficiently permissive licensing terms. Negotiating for data that lies buried behind a firewall while the fires are burning is clearly too late.</div>
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Of course, there will always be valid exceptions to making data open, such as personally identifiable information, national security, and commercial considerations, etc., but the starting position should be one of data openness. Unfortunately, the barriers are more often than not cultural, not technical, as the tendency in the past has been to horde information in many disciplines.</div>
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In many public sector organizations, just publishing the data (and metadata) is often sufficient. The Bureau of Statistics comes to mind. In fact, many government organizations should consider recasting themselves as information <i>wholesalers,</i> and just leave it to the non-profit and private sectors to use the data to create products and services for the public.</div>
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In scientific pursuits, however, open data is necessary but not sufficient. As any student learns in school, the scientific method demands repeatability, which increasingly demands more than publishing just the data and the method. This is particularly true where scientific research involves complex computational models and software, without which it is virtually impossible for others to replicate results. Further, where datasets evolve over time and derivative works are created, it is essential to establish traceability and provenance of the data. In other words, everything that goes into the science, the data, methods, tools, etc. needs to be transparent. This is what I mean by <b>open science</b>.</div>
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Sadly, by this definition much of today's science is far from open. For example, only around half of all clinical trials around the world have ever been published. Some trials have not even been registered! This hidden science is leading to bad treatment decisions, missed opportunities for good medicine, and needless repetition of trials with wasted funds. Go to <a href="http://alltrials.net/">alltrials.net</a> to learn more.</div>
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My talk was more controversial than I expected and the reaction was decidedly bipolar. On the one hand, there were scientists excited about working more openly, although struggling to overcome the constraints placed upon them by academia. For example, today the impact of scientific publications is largely measured by citations. In a world of open science, there clearly need to be new ways to measure the impact of science beyond the traditional methods. For example, if a scientist publishes data that another scientist uses, then it should be recognized as such.</div>
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On the other hand, there is an old vanguard that is threatened by open science. One person told me my ideas were "dangerous" and that science could devolve into a blogosphere of non-peer-reviewed science and endless Climategate-like affairs. ("Climategate" was a fabricated controversy based on dodgy interpretations of emails between scientists discussing climate data.) I found this line of reasoning to be confusing since nothing about open science is in conflict with the scientific method and peer-reviewed science. Open science is really about making science more transparent and accelerating the creation and dissemination of scientific knowledge, by making it easier to replicate scientific results. </div>
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<span class="s2">I ended my talk by reminding the audience of TERN's goal of <i>"</i></span><i>connecting ecosystem scientists and enabling them to collect, contribute, store, share and integrate data across disciplines."</i> <span class="s2">It is a worthy goal and one that lends itself to an open approach.</span><br />
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Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5200149260011025425.post-53464638881330275532013-02-11T14:00:00.002+11:002013-02-14T07:38:31.396+11:00Kickstarting Aussie Startups - Having a go<i>This is my 5th post in a series on kick starting Aussie startups. The first post is <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2012/04/kickstarting-aussie-startups-qualified.html" target="_blank">here</a>. </i><br />
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In <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/kickstarting-aussie-startups-stock.html" target="_blank">my previous post</a>, I described how how incentive stock employees can make startups financially more attractive. The reality is that all of the incentives in the world though won't help one iota if you’re not prepared to “have a go” - as we Aussies love to say. “Having a go” means taking some risks and not being afraid to fail sometimes. I've <a href="http://techchomp.blogspot.com.au/2011/11/you-cannot-innovate-without-failure.html" target="_blank">written before</a> about the need to embrace failure, so this time I want to go big and ask the question, “<i>How do we create a whole new generation of entrepreneurs?</i>” Here are my thoughts:<br />
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Firstly, we need to create the right culture in schools where kids can experiment with different ideas and ways of doing things and where "getting things wrong" is not branded as a "failure", but is merely part of the learning experience. Kids will learn that having a go at something is not to be feared. "Failure" loses its sting when it is just a normal part of learning. In fact, suffering failures in the right environment has the opposite effect; it builds resilience and grit. We should look at ways to build risk taking into school curricula. For example, Wimbledon High School in the UK is introducing “<a href="http://www.wimbledonhigh.gdst.net/failure-week.html" target="_blank">Failure Week</a>” to help build resilience in their students.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Apollo 11 takes off for the moon</i></td></tr>
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Secondly, we need to teach kids some basic entrepreneurial skills, and the earlier we start, the better. To quote <a href="http://www.kidpreneurs.org/" target="_blank">Kidpreneurs</a>, <i>“It’s never too early!”</i> Kidpreneurs believe that even children can be introduced to basic business principles and the rewards of entrepreneurship. I agree. Anyone who is old enough to conjure up an interesting idea, is old enough to think of ways it might be commercialized. Of course, not all ideas will stand up to scrutiny, but there is no harm in trying. Or as my Mum always says, <i>“Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”</i><br />
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Thirdly, we need to arm kids with the right technical skills, by which I mean <b>science, technology, engineering and mathematics</b> (STEM) skills. Sure, not all entrepreneurs require technical skills. There’s plenty of room for talented entrepreneurs of other persuasions, such as in the arts, journalism, law and other professions. Nevertheless, we live in a technological society, and by and large, the future will be created by people with technical skills and the confidence to put them to good use. Which leads to my final point.<br />
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Fourthly, we need to create widespread awareness of the wonderful world of opportunities out there for people that are not afraid to “have a go”. The Apollo moonshot inspired my generation, but there is plenty to inspire the current generation. Watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uaquGZKx_0" target="_blank">this video</a> and be inspired. We need to get messages like this out to every student, so they’re inspired to create tomorrow’s future.<br />
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If we do these well, we’ll be well on our way to creating a new generation of entrepreneurs, and an amazing future.Alan Noblehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03045139067146619664noreply@blogger.com1